Sensor networks may be used to monitor a variety of parameters, such as environmental parameters, structural parameters, or electrical parameters. As a number of sensors included in a sensor network increases, additional infrastructure and communication components are typically needed for the sensor network to be implemented. For a sensor network that includes thousands of sensors, wiring to connect each sensor to a data collection point (e.g., a controller) may be extensive. For example, a wire bundle with one wire per sensor may be used to communicate to the data collection point for processing and response. When implementing the sensor network using the wire bundle, the wire bundle may pose many drawbacks, such as weight, installation costs, cross-connections and interference (e.g., shorting), and poor reliability.
To reduce an amount of wiring used to implement sensor networks, a common medium, such as a bus, may be used for some or all of the sensors. However, implementing a sensor network using the common medium may present difficulties associated with synchronization, configuration, and coordination. For example, a sensor network having the common medium is typically implemented in a digital domain (e.g., communication using digital signals) using digital physical layers (PHY) with protocols, such as an Ethernet protocol, that are much more complex than necessary for simple sensors and that have variable transmission delays that do not meet latency requirements of the sensor network. Additionally, sensor networks that have hundreds or thousands of sensors sharing the common medium have several network management issues (e.g., configuration and coordination) that make using the common medium infeasible.